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During 2009, violent crime declined for the third year in a row, with an estimated 5.3 percent drop from 2008 figures. Property crime continued to fall as well—for a seventh straight year—with an estimated decrease of 4.6 percent. That’s according to our just-released report, Crime in the United States, 2009.

These latest statistics come 80 years to the month after we took over the responsibility of compiling and publishing the nation’s crime data from the International Association of Chiefs of Police. The categories back in 1930 were almost identical to what we have today—murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, larceny-theft, burglary, and auto theft. (Arson came later.)

Where do these numbers come from? From the 17,985 city, county, university and college, state, tribal, and federal agencies who participated in the Uniform Crime Reporting program in 2009.These agencies represent 96.3 percent of the nation’s population.

The report also contains plenty of additional details, charts, and tables on crime during 2009, including more on offenses, criminals, victims, weapons used, geographic locations, etc. To find out about the crime picture in your state, go to our State Totals table.

As always, a word of warning about drawing conclusions of the data by making direct comparisons between cities—valid assessments are possible only with careful study and analysis of the range of unique conditions affecting each local law enforcement jurisdiction.

And coming this fall—the 2009 Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted and Hate Crime Statistics reports, which will be posted on this website.